Matt Gurney on the UN force in Syria: May we visit your killing fields? No? OK, then

The UN force in Syria: May we visit your killing fields? No? OK, then

Reports have emerged over the last 24 hours about another massacre of civilians by forces loyal to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. According to local sources, the village of Qubair was shelled with artillery, then invaded by pro-regime militias. These same local sources report that at least 78 people were killed by the ground forces, many of them executed with knives or close-range gunfire. Photos have emerged of rows of bodies in the village, including many women and children. The Syrian government acknowledges that something did indeed happen in Qubair. In its version of events, security forces attacked a terrorist hideout, resulting in nine deaths and several injured soldiers.

If only there was some way for the international community to verify that the massacre did indeed take place, and present neutral, unbiased evidence documenting the carnage. Imagine, for instance, some international organization assembling a group of trained experts who could travel within Syria, investigating reports of violence and then report on their findings to the global community. What’s what, you say? There’s already such a thing, in the form of 300 United Nations observers monitoring the situation in Syria? Well, that’s brilliant, then. Why didn’t they just scurry on over and check out the facts on the ground?

They tried? And the Syrian Army stopped them and told them they couldn’t go into the village? Oh. OK, then.

Amid all the scattered information coming out of Syria, at least this piece of news can be taken at face-value. It comes from the UN itself, which reports:

United Nations observers in Syria have been obstructed in their attempts to reach the village of Mazraat al-Qubeir today, to verify reports of large-scale killings there.

“Their mission is being obstructed by three factors: First, they are being stopped at Syrian Army checkpoints and in some cases turned back; second, some of our patrols are being stopped by civilians in the area; third, we are receiving information from residents of the area that the safety of our observers is at risk if we enter the village,” the head of the United Nations Supervision Mission in Syria (UNSMIS), Major-General Robert Mood, said in a statement.

Gee, whodathunk that a regime that shells its own civilians and lets loose militias against them, then insists the whole thing was just a skirmish with terrorists, might not be entirely co-operative with those sent to investigate their war crimes. Why, it’s almost as if sending the UN observers over there might not have been worth the effort at all.

To be fair, it’s always worth trying. Maybe the local regime co-operates, maybe it doesn’t. If the UN had any integrity, it would be able to spin that into a win eitherway. Obviously, if the violence stops, that’s good, but if it doesn’t, the UN observers can declare that the regime is refusing to co-operatve and simply leave, saying that the local regime threatened their safety. It’d be neat to see China and Russia trying to explain away the evacuation of the UN observers because they were unable to get their job done and, in fact, had faced danger.

Instead, by continuing the ridiculous farce that the UN observers are accomplishing anything, the UN is only damaging itself and the international community. It would be better for the UN to declare that it was unable to help in Syria than pretend that it could, and then fail. Reports have emerged that local activists and community leaders, fearful of being the next targets, have lost all faith in the UN’s ability to help them. In other words, they’re finally getting the message: The UN can’t help them, and it’s mystifying that they pretend that they can.

Worse than mystifying, actually — counterproductive. The Assad regime bought itself months of time by agreeing to go through the motions of international co-operation. He keeps killing his enemies while the UN looks ever-stupider (one would hope there is an eventual rock-bottom that the UN’s credibility will hit, but it seems positively China Syndrome-esque in its ability to sink ever lower). This isn’t the fault of the observers themselves, who are trying their best, far from their families, in dangerous conditions. The fault is with the very concept of their mission, and the organization they represent.

There might n0t be much that the international community can do for Syria. There certainly isn’t much it’s willing to do. You’d think it would at least have the good sense not to embarrass itself by flaunting its helplessness. But you’d be wrong.

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